The day I died
by RIPprincess
Summary: *Authors note: This is a fan fiction story based on The Walking Dead, but contains all original characters. Think of it as a webisode, but, in fan fiction form.*
1. Grace

It was a beautiful day, the day I died. Not a cloud in the sky, birds chirping, flowers blooming, a hayfield so overgrown it seemed to touch the sky.

Adam and I had been holed up in an old storm shelter for about a month. My Grandfather had built it back in the seventies as a bomb shelter when he was up in arms about the Communist conspires. My father had transformed it into a storm shelter in the nineties when I was a kid. It was equipped with a functioning well and plumbing, was fully solar powered and had enough food to last a month, my father always made sure of that. When I was a teenager, Adam and I used to sneak out there to fool around, and later after we were married, we snuck out there during holidays and family reunions just to get some peace and quiet. The day the outbreak happened in our area, this is exactly what we had been doing.

Aunt Addie had been in the kitchen gossiping to my cousin Emma about Uncle David's prostate surgery. The kids were squealing and running circles around the living room. And Mom was trying to cook while my Grandmother was taking the spoon away trying to tell her how to do it. There was such a ruckus in the house that day so no one noticed when Adam and I took a box of wine, disappearing into the shelter.

We had lost track of time, and when the box was empty, Adam looked at me and asked, "What time is it?"

"Six," I told him as I checked my phone. I laughed realizing how long we had been there "We've been out here for five hours! I wonder if they even noticed."

Adam laughed as well, standing up. "We'll just have to find out." He extended his hand, helping me to my feet.

. We exited the shelter still; carrying on about the lost time. At the same time my Uncle David came out of the house in a panic, walking with a strange limp. Afraid he had torn some of the stitches from his surgery, I ran toward him. "Uncle David? What's wrong?"

"She bit me" He stammered out, breathless. "Everyone. It's a… " He stopped abruptly, and his eyes rolled up in his head.

As he slumped over limp, I tried to catch him, shaking him as I laid him down. "Who bit you? What about everyone else? Dave, what's happening? Shit!" I turned to Adam, who was watching the whole thing in shock. "Shit Adam, you just going to stand there?" I grabbed a hold of his arm and ran inside to check on the others.

Walking into the house was like a scene out of a horror movie. It was a massacre, blood everywhere, broken furniture, bodies lying all over the floor. I started counting as my eyes filled with tears at the sight of my family. "Adam" I whispered. "There's two missing. Maybe they're still alive."

We started searching the house. I found my eight year old niece sitting over my mother's dead body, in the back corner of the master bedroom. Her little blonde pigtails splattered with blood, she was sitting straight up, and it looked as if she were trying to wake my mother up. "Gracie" I called out to her. Her head snapped to attention at the sound of my voice. Slowly but jerky, she turned her head to look towards the noise. I gasped seeing her face. It was covered in blood. Pieces of flesh were hanging from her mouth and there was a large gaping hole in the front of her neck.

"I-Is she -eating- your mom?" Adam asked in all seriousness.

Grace or what used to be Grace came charging us, mouth agape, eyes vacant, and appeared to be looking to us for another meal. I grabbed a hold of Adam's shirt and started running out of the room, peeling him away from the tragedy, shutting and locking the door behind us. As we approached the living room again, I heard sounds, like moaning. "Shh, you hear that?" I asked Adam.

"Yeah," he answered, "Sounds like someone may still be alive. Come on."

We followed the noise to find the bodies still where we left them. Most of them. There was a trail of blood leading into the kitchen, we followed it slowly. I could almost swear I saw some of those bodies twitching as we walked passed them, but I chalked it up to my imagination and kept walking. We entered the kitchen to see my cousin Emma, badly injured, her body jarring unnaturally with each step. "Emma!" I walked towards her to help. She turned hard towards me. With a vicious snarl she lunged at me. I screamed. She kept attacking us. Adam grabbed a knife out of the butcher block. He stabbed her in the chest. She kept coming. It was like she felt no pain, the knife sticking in her chest where her heart should be had no effect whatsoever.

"The fuck?" he said seeing how much good stabbing her did. Turning around to reach for another knife, he saw them. "Baby, we gotta go, now!" He pointed at the living room where all the bodies of my family had suddenly reanimated, and were heading our way. We made a run for the storm shelter. Maybe if we could make it there we could survive and wait this thing out.


	2. As Good A Time As Any

It had been a month, or I can only imagine that it had been a month. The only thing we had to keep track of the time was our cell phones, and they had long since died. There were no windows to keep track of whether it was day or night, and we didn't dare open the door. I could only guess that it had been a month because the food supplies were dwindling. The radio had stopped broadcasting anything other than a continuous loop of emergency information. Adam was losing his mind listening to it and had smashed the radio by the end of the first week.

We kept ourselves entertained by playing board games, card games, and talking. I smile now thinking of those conversations and how I realized how much people really had stopped talking. I mean, Adam and I had known each other almost all our lives, and I don't think I really knew him until the world started collapsing around us. We traded every single story and memory locked inside our minds. We talked about what was going on outside the walls, and every possible and impossible scenario that could have caused this to happen. Some were silly, some were down right horrific, but regardless, we both understood how lucky we had been that day.

That particular day, was a day neither of us had thought about. Maybe it was because we didn't think this would have gone on long enough to put us in that situation. Maybe it was because we were both terrified of what would happen, but, as I stared at the last can of beefaroni, I silently freaked out. We knew it was coming, but we had both ignored it. As we shared that last can I broke the silence that hung in the air. I had to say what both of us had been ignoring.

"We're going to have to get more food."

Adam said nothing, he just nodded his head.

"This isn't going to be easy, you know that.

Again Adam offered nothing but a nod of the head.

"Adam, say something. Tell me it's going to be alright. Tell me, we'll find food no problem, tell me we're going to walk out those doors and it'll be over. Tell me someone poisoned that box of wine and we hallucinated the whole thing." I started to lose it. "Tell me the world has been taken over by fucking gummy bears, and I have to eat my way through them! Just say something!"

"Baby," he said calmly, though I could see the terrified look in his eyes, "we'll be fine. I'm sure the government and the military has this mess under control. We've been in here long enough, and if not, we will be able to find food. Promise."

We finished that last can rather quickly, but I was still hungry. "When do you want to go?"

He breathed out a sharp breath. "Now's as good a time as any, I suppose." He got up from the table and approached the door. I followed quickly behind him. I put my hand on his shoulder as he put his hand on the door. I felt him tremble as he turned the lock.

"Let me." I said taking the door handle in my hand. I turned it and cracked the door. It was pitch black out. I shut the door. "I think it's better we wait until it's light before going out there."

Adam just nodded his head again.

"Maybe we could get some sleep? Get out there with a little bit of a plan. Prepare for the worst and hope for the best."

Adam seemed relieved and walked over to the cots we had pushed together. He laid down, staring up at the ceiling. I joined him, and as we drifted off to sleep, we discussed the plans and possible scenarios for the following day. That night I dreamt of our wedding, of my sixteenth birthday, of that day we had that picnic and it rained on us. All the wonderful memories of my life were flooding my mind in one beautiful dream.

I awoke rested and smiling. Adam looked troubled. I figured the task at hand that day had been weighing heavy on his mind.

"You okay?" I asked him as the rumble began in my stomach.

He looked sullen through his forced smile. "Yeah," he said. "We should get going, I'm already getting hungry."

He got up and went to the door. I followed him, noting that the same nerves that had engulfed him last night at the door had come back, I stepped passed him and put my hand on the handle. He stopped me. "I got it." He said coldly.

"Do we have some kind of plan?" I snapped back.

He collected himself and put his hands on my shoulders gently. "Hey," he said with a much more relaxed tone. "We don't have any weapons in here. Once we get out, look around and pick up anything that you think can be used. If we find its all over, great. If not, we'll need them when we get into town. All we have to do is get from here to the car."

I nodded, appreciating his level head in the situation. He turned his attention back to the handle on the door. I felt the anxiety wash over me as he turned it and cracked the door open. I felt like I was going to pass out as the bright light passed through the crack. Adam looked back at me.

I think he must have noticed a look in my eyes, or maybe I had grown pale. "Hey," he said as he took my hand in his. "I've got you. I won't let anything happen to you, okay?"

Slowly, I nodded my head, breathing slowly to regain composure. Suddenly he's acting like a knight in shining armor. I thought. Where was this Adam a month ago? Where was this Adam yesterday? That was the last I thought of it. I was just happy this Adam had finally showed up.

He opened the door a little more, peeking his head out, looking for any signs of danger. "It's clear." he said, guiding me out of the shelter.

The sun burned my eyes as I stepped into the natural light for the first time since we took shelter there. Adam guided me for the first few steps until my eyes adjusted. It's hotter than I remember. I thought as I scanned the area for anything that could be used as a weapon.

"Over there," Adam said pointing. "Run and grab that shovel."

I did, as he went in the opposition direction, collecting an aluminum baseball bat. Once we met back up, I placed a hand on his shoulder to stop him.

"It's so quiet. Maybe it's over." I told him as we cautiously made our way to the car.


	3. A New Place

The ride into town was littered with the evidence that this was not over. The dead were in fact still walking. I stared out the window, silent the whole ride, taking in the devastation that had crept over our town. Had it only been a month? Every building looked worn, and the fields overgrown. I started questioning how long we had actually been in the shelter.

I was surprised how short the ride felt. It usually took us an hour to get into town from my parents place, but without traffic and lights slowing us down it took half that time.

Adam slowed his speed to almost a crawl as we entered the town. It was in shambles. We pulled up to the general store, and got out of the car.

"Shit" Adam said looking over the store. It had all its windows busted out, broken glass covering the storefront. Empty cans and boxes, spoiled meat, it smelled like death.

"This place looks gutted" I told Adam. "I don't think we're going to find anything here."

He turned sharply to look at me and said in an almost vacant tone, "We'll have to go out to that superstore, there's bound to be something there"

I didn't say a word; I just slid back into my seat. The way Adam had made that decision almost scared me. He was terrible under pressure, crumbled when it came to being an authority figure or making decisions. It was part of the reason we had decided not to have any children. He knew, however, exactly what to do just then, while I was blanking.

The superstore was on the other side of town. I remember when they put it in, there were protesters and almost nobody would shop there. Everyone feared that the local businesses would be run out by the big corporate monster. They ended up working well, side by side, but it became ironic to me how none of that even mattered now.

The large parking lot was vacant, yet Adam still pulled the car into a painted parking spot out of habit. I felt myself trembling as we walked up to the doors holding our weapons. I looked to Adam for comfort. He did not look like the same man that was shaking at the door of the shelter, just a day before. He looked calm, in control of the situation. This calmed me and frightened me at the same time. "Adam? Are you alright? I asked him.

He turned and smiled at me. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just trying to get this over with."

We looked at the doors that used to be automated to open as you approached. With no electricity, we were going to have to pry them open. Adam scanned the horizon for anything coming our way, and motioned for me to take position at one of the doors. We both took hold of the doors, gripping the best we could and pulled. I struggled against the door, and it wasn't budging. Adam's side wasn't budging either.

He stopped pulling and inspected the door. "Someone locked it from the inside, look." he said pointing to the crack between the doors. I could see a bolt connecting the two doors, and there was no place to put a key. He was right.

"Someone has to be in there." I said quietly. "Alive or dead, someone locked themselves in here." I started beating on the door. "Please" I yelled, hoping someone would hear me. "Help! Open up!"

Adam pulled me off the door, pushed me against the wall and covered my mouth. "Do you want the dead things to know we're here?"

"They're dead." I said pulling his hand off my mouth. "What makes you think they can even hear us?"

At that moment, I saw what Adam had been trying to elude. A group of at least ten of the undead beasts rounded the corner, and was coming straight for us. I froze. I think I even stopped breathing in the moment. All I could hear was the sound of my own heart beating inside my head. I don't even know what Adam did to open the door, but next thing I knew; he's dragging me inside the store.

"Close the goddamn door!" He yelled at me in a harsh tone.

I came to my senses quickly after that and grabbed a hold of one of the doors and pushed it closed as quickly as I could. I turned my back on the door as the undead monsters came charging up to it. I slid my back down the door, trying to catch my breath. I landed on the floor, not being able to feel my legs in the moment. What I could feel was the pounding on my back as the creatures tried to infiltrate the building.

Adam secured the doors once again as I just sat there. What was wrong with me? I never caved like this. I was crumbling here. I felt the tears well up in my eyes and the heat from them falling down my cheeks as I sat there. Adam stood in front of me and extended his hand to help me up.

I wiped my face and took a deep breath before accepting it and getting back on my feet. "Grab a cart" He said. "We'll need as much as we can get."

I followed his order, returning with a basket. I didn't see him anywhere.

"It was just a few seconds", I think. "Where the hell did he go?" Then out loud. "Adam?" I walked into the dark store, saying his name, hopefully loud enough for him to hear me.

I turned the corner, heading down an aisle, and was met, face to face with a man with a large pole sticking out of his stomach. My breath caught in my throat, realizing that this man was one of those things. I was not going to freeze again. I grab my shovel from inside the cart and walked toward him. I was holding the shovel like a baseball bat, breathing shallow and walking towards the figure. As he got closer, I reared back with the shovel and drove it into his face with all my might. He fell down on his back. I was stunned to see with two mortal wounds the man was still moving. Without a moments more hesitation, I took the shovel and rammed it into his neck, taking its head off in one clean movement. Seeing the head of that man rolling around on the ground with its jaws still trying to bite at anything near was all that I could handle. I backed into the freezer case, shaking my head.

"No, no, no. oh my God. This really doesn't feel good." or at least that's what I think came out of my mouth.

I pulled myself together, and decided it was time to get supplies and get the hell out of there. I went down each, aisle looking for Adam, and gathering food and other supplies as I went on. After what felt like a half hour, I started getting nervous. I headed towards the other side of the store with a cart full of supplies.

As I passed the pharmacy, I heard a rustle. I gripped the shovel again, heading toward the noise. "Adam? Adam, tell me that's you?"

"Hey," He peeked his head around a corner. "It's me; I'm just getting some things."

"What do we need from the pharmacy? I asked.

"Oh, I don't know." He said sarcastically. "Pain killers, antibiotics, you never know when you'll need any of this stuff."

I smiled at him knowing he was right, and relieved that I had found him. Then I had an Idea.

"Hey, What if we just stay here?"

"Here?" He asked, mulling over the idea.

"Yeah, we could make sure there's not any more of those things in here, and set up. Everything we could possibly need for the foreseeable future is right here."

I knew he heard everything I had said, but his face showed he had only fixated on part of it. "What do you mean, any -more- of them?"

"It's no big deal," I assured him. "I ran into one over by the food. I took care of it."

"He looked at me and nodded his head. "I guess we could give it a try, staying here. Maybe just one night. If we don't like it, we can go back."

I wrapped my arms around him and squeezed him tight. I couldn't fathom going out there again. This place was quiet, and had food and supplies for months. It stunk to hell, but I found myself visualizing turning this place into a home.

"We could take all the spoiled food and the bodies and throw them out the back." I started talking faster in my excitement. "They have furniture and camping supplies. I can't believe we found this! It'll be-"

"Don't get ahead of yourself." He said cutting me off. "We still have to make sure this place is really empty. It looks like it may be getting dark soon, so we'll have to hurry."

Making sure the building was free from the undead was a task that proved to be easy, yet nerve wracking. The only one we found was the one I had already decapitated in the aisle earlier. It must have been the man who locked himself in there. It made me sick to my stomach to think I had taken a man's head off.

Adam and I, confident in our safety for the night, headed over to the camping supplies, where we set up for the night. We enjoyed a simple can of soup each. And busied ourselves (to help kill time). I figured that now was a good time to learn to crochet, and Adam sat down with a notebook. I remember looking at him thinking about how before all this, he used to write all the time. That night was the first time he had picked up a pen since it all started. He looked at ease for the first time as well. I smiled, thinking that we had found our new home.

Later that night, we laid down on a bed made of sleeping bags and throw pillows. Adam held me and told me how much he loved me, over and over again. I was almost asleep when he got up.

"Where you going baby?" I asked sleepily.

"Getting a drink. That's all. Go back to sleep."

All I remember of that night after that was him crawling back in bed and whispering something to me, but I couldn't really hear what it was.


End file.
